Monday, April 19, 2004

Ludicrous Speed...Go!

In the movie Spaceballs, "ludicrous speed" was an insanely high velocity at which the starship Spaceball 1 could travel. Today at work, our internet connection is moving at ludicrous speed, but it isn't because it's moving fast. Quite the contrary: it's painfully slow. Trying to do anything online has been an exercise in frustration.

There is light at the end of this tunnel however. Our company is moving from a shared dial-up connection to IDSL. It won't be high-speed access, but it should be a significant improvement from what we have now. That will make everything so much easier. Our IT staff (consisting of one person, who also happens to be our head engineer) tells me our new connection should be live by Wednesday of this week. I have an awful feeling that he may have overestimated how quickly it will happen, but I'm at least mildly comforted to know that modern technology (sort of) is on its way.

Our internet problems rate as a minor inconvenience, though. I had a good weekend, so it would take something far more significant to really bother me today. Tomorrow may be another story, though, if these problems continue to wear on my nerves.

I drove to Brandi's apartment in Stow on Friday after work. It was a nice drive, now that it's far enough into spring that the sun is up for the whole drive. When it's light out, the Ohio Turnpike actually does offer some decent scenery. I listened to the Reds game for much of the drive, and there are few better companions on a solitary drive than announcers Marty Brennamen and Joe Nuxhall. While I'm talking about this, I want to give a shout out to the radio station 700 (AM) WLW out of Cincinnati. I have a hard time getting some Toledo radio stations in Bowling Green, but WLW has an incredible signal, and it was clear as a bell from Toledo almost all the way to Cleveland, when I switched to my CD player because the game was over. I'm really happy about this, because that's mostly Indians country, and I doubt there are any local stations carrying the Reds.

I got to Brandi's place a little after 7:00, and we went to Red Lobster for dinner. I personally cannot stomach most seafood (and can't bear to even look at some of it), but Brandi likes it, so I took her there. They cater to non-surf people with a few token turf items on the menu, so I chose from those. It was pretty good, too.

After dinner, we headed back to her place. We had a pretty hectic time last weekend, so we mostly just wanted to chill out and relax this weekend. We definitely did that, starting on Friday night. We put in a movie and promptly fell asleep on the living room floor. We slept there for quite a while before eventually moving into the bedroom and continuing our slumber.

On Saturday, Brandi got up to take a bike ride while I stayed home. I had brought my PlayStation, so I played my new basketball game while she was gone. As it was quite a nice weekend, Brandi went out to lay in the sun when she got home, and I sat outside with her. We went to get ice cream after that, and then back home for more PlayStation.

That evening we went to BW3 in Garfield Heights. Brandi had planned a get-together there with some of her co-workers. Unfortunately, none of them showed up, but she and I still had a good time. The BW3 there is really cool. It doesn't have the atmosphere of the ones in BG or Kent, both college towns, but the restaurant itself was nice. It was really big, and there was plenty of space between tables. In the ones at BG and Kent, it gets pretty crowded, but that was definitely not a problem at this place. We ate there and had a few drinks, then played a few games of pool before heading home.

Sunday, as is our custom, was even more of a do-nothing day. Brandi again went out to lay in the sun. I went out with her for a few minutes, then came back in to be with my PlayStation. We went to the store when she came back in, so we could get a few things for dinner that night. We had lunch when we got back, then napped for a while. Brandi got up before I did and started making dinner. When I got up, we played PlayStation together until dinner was ready. She made roasted chicken and fettucine alfredo, and it was awesome.

We went for a walk after dinner, to enjoy the nice weather of the weekend as it wound down. We walked about three miles, and my feet are still a little sore even now. It was pretty muggy out, and we were both really warm by the time we got home. She ended up firing up her air conditioner, which was very nice. We watched a movie and ate ice cream while we wound down, and then went to bed.

All in all, I think we relaxed enough this weekend that it'll take at least a day or two for my screwed-up sleep cycle to bring me down again.

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